


give it up

by piratesails



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Enchanted Forest, Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Bar Wench Emma Swan, F/M, Friends to Lovers, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-11
Updated: 2016-04-11
Packaged: 2018-06-01 16:58:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6528427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piratesails/pseuds/piratesails
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based off of the prompt: “Tell me to go and I will, but if you ask me to stay I’ll never leave you again.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	give it up

**Author's Note:**

> written for a drabble challenge over on my tumblr, but it ended up being much longer than I anticipated. anyway I liked it enough to put it up on here so, enjoy! drop me a comment with your thoughts and feelings and such!
> 
> (I see a pattern developing with my constant use of this friends to lovers trope - I may have a problem.)

“Princess!” His booming voice reaches her over the several heads in the tavern and she instantly starts searching through the crowd to find him. It doesn’t take too long - the man’s long, black coat is easy enough to spot. So are his stark blue eyes rimmed with kohl. She would know those from miles away.

“I told you not to call me that,” Emma rolls her eyes once he’s leaning against the other side of the bar, dimples flashing at her.

“But you are my princess,” he says matter-of-factly despite her very unroyal status. “Now, how’s about a round for my crew and rum for the pair of us, hm?”

“I don’t get off until an hour from now,” she pushes through the short bar door with her legs, balancing the tray of glasses in her hands. She’s always one step ahead of him with the orders, knowing exactly what he’d ask for and what his crew drinks; it’s always the same.

He gets up to follow her through the crowd once she begins distributing the drinks, “Come on, Swan, I’ve so much to tell you. About the Jolly, about the storm, about Agrabah, about-”

She spins around to him, shoving the empty tray in his hands. “Later, Killian.”

He groans and slumps a little where he stands and she wonders, for the near hundredth time, how this man came to be a pirate captain that commands his crew with an iron fist when he’s so capable of acting like a petulant child. She shoots him another look and he straightens with a nod, making his way to one of the handful of wooden benches his crew is occupying.

She spends the hour between the bar and the tables, filling and refilling with a sense of familiarity. Her eyes dart back to Killian every now and then, his raucous laughter filling the crowded tavern. It’s as though he’s been keeping track of the time, though, because just a minute before she’s due to leave, he’s at her side with a gentle hand on her forearm in question.

“Give me a minute,” she says to him as she drops the empty glasses at the bar and waves goodbye to Leroy. And then she grabs a bottle of rum from below the cabinets before pulling Killian out through the backdoor.

The quiet surrounds them immediately and Emma breathes a little easier in the fresh air that carries hint of salt.

“My, my, stealing are we?” He raises an eyebrow at the bottle, “Always said you had a little pirate in you.”

Emma chuckles, uncapping the bottle and taking a pull from it as they stroll down to the port. It’s an unsaid tradition, one she doesn’t exactly remember either of them consciously starting. But she’s known him for years now, their camaraderie one that established over a few months of him constantly making port in town and frequenting her tavern. Despite her sharp tongue and defenses, he’d managed to wriggle his way into becoming a constant in her life.

Well, as constant as one can be when they’re out sailing and discovering new lands every fortnight.

She misses him just that much more with each time he leaves. But she never tells him. Never mentions that everything is so much easier when he’s around, how her chest feels lighter and her smiles come quicker.

“How’s your boy?” He asks mid stroll.

“He’s doing good, smarter than I ever was. I really lucked out with him,” she smiles as she thinks about Henry. He’s only five, but he’s so clever that she nearly cries of joy each time she thinks about it. “He was asking about you the other day.”

Killian smiles too, then, “I’m still waiting for the day you finally let me teach him how to wield a sword.”

She mutters jokingly about him being a bad influence and he knocks his shoulder with hers in reply. “So, Agrabah?” She says, passing him the bottle as they sit down on the wooden planks of the dock, letting their feet hang just a few inches above the water. The ends of her dress are definitely going to get wet but she can’t find it in herself to care.

“Aye,” he swallows a mouthful of rum and gets that beautiful twinkle in his eye that Emma can’t get enough of, “the kingdom is magnificent, Swan. The thrones are carved of gold and the archways covered in jewels. Their marketplaces brimming with life, women wearing colours I’ve never seen before, and the way they dance, it’s as though I’m watching poetry in motion, love.”

He recalls his tales to her, every word brimming with more passion than the last. And she’s mesmerised as always, caught up in the way he weaves his stories and makes her feels as though she’s there. She likes to think that in his past life, Killian was a storyteller. Some days, she also likes to think that their past lives collided; there’s only few other explanations for how simple it is to be with him. (How quick she is to crave his company, his clear wit, his kisses to her temple when he parts.)

(It’s that last one that has her tossing in her bed, because he always leaves.)

By the time he’s exhausted his stories, they’re pressed together from hip to knee, the bottle resting on his thigh in his grip.

“I wish you were there with me, Swan,” he confesses quietly, “you’d like it out on the ocean.” She’d like it anywhere as long as it was with him, if she’s being honest.

“I can’t be a pirate, I can barely manage the tavern on my own,” she says lightly, trying to diffuse the disappointment she feels for not being able to follow him. She could adjust to that life if she wanted to, but for someone who grew up as unstably as she did, she’s quite proud of the life she’s made for herself here. It’s hers, no matter how monotonous it is. Plus, she’s got Henry, people in this town that know her and are her friends; she’d never really had a home until Leroy gave her a job sweeping in the mornings, not batting an eye when she’d walked in with a newborn in her arms.

“Now, you give yourself such little credit, princess. You are capable of wondrous things.”

Emma snorts. “Yeah, no one else can drink you under the table, Captain.”

He nudges her knee with his, “That was one time.”

“It was three times.”

“Fine.”

A beat of comfortable silence passes them then and Emma uses it to stare out at the waves. And then she begrudgingly asks, “How long are you here for this time?”

He places the bottle on the floor beside him and sighs, craning his neck to watch the stars, “Three days, maybe four. Smee spoke of an approaching storm and it would be easier to get to Arendelle before it strikes. The crew gets restless if they stay put for too long and we wouldn’t want a mutiny on our hands.”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll be back, love, you know that.”

She nods but keeps her eyes on the horizon.

“Emma?” He prods. She turns to him then, and feels that clench in her stomach when their eyes meet. (Because he always leaves.) “You do know I will return, right?”

She exhales, “Yeah, I do.”

“What’s bothering you, then?” He lifts up a hand to press at her brow and she only realises then that she’s scrunched them together. She leans into his touch, no matter how small, chasing the warmth of his calloused fingers.

She’s about to lie to him and tell him that it’s nothing, but the open sincerity in his gaze gives her pause. She always swallows down her feelings but tonight, for some reason, she’s feeling brave. “It’s just- I don’t like doing this,” she whispers into the dark, focusing on the spot where his shoulder and neck meets to keep her courage from faltering. “Saying goodbye to you over and over again.”

He stays silent for a long while, but his hand remains on her skin and she wonders if that’s a good sign that he isn’t moving away. Because it’s the closest she’s ever come to admitting her feelings, and without knowing how he feels at all. She could be wrecking this, picking it apart before it even has a chance to grow. It’s selfish, probably. Definitely.

“I didn’t know you felt this way,” he whispers.

Emma gives him a pathetic shrug, still refusing to meet his eyes. It would be easier if he leaves, right? It would be easier if he didn’t keep coming back and taking a part of her heart with him every time he leaves.

“What do you want from me, love?” He doesn’t say it with any hostility or frustration, but a gentle lilt that’s more of an honest question. He genuinely wants to know what she wants, wants to know if he can give it to her.

(She wants him to settle down here, but she can’t do that to him. She can’t take his dream of seeing the world away from him.)

“I just want you to be happy,” she says instead, managing a shaky smile and finally looking at him.

“Tell me honestly, Swan.” He cups her cheek fully, the cold metal of his ring pressing against her skin. “Would you rather I leave and never come back?”

She doesn’t reply to that.

(It would be easier, right?)

“Tell me to go and I will,” he swallows, darting his eyes between hers, “but if you ask me to stay I’ll never leave you again.”

It takes her a second to register his words, the air knocking out of her lungs when she does. She shakes her head vehemently, “Killian, no, your life is out there, it’s your dream-”

“Dreams can change, Swan.”

“You can’t give that up for this town, you’d hate it here.”

“I’d give it up for _you_ , love,” he leans in closer to her, “I’d give it all up if it meant being by your side, if it meant watching Henry grow into the strong man I know he will be, if it meant holding you in my arms every day. The ocean may be my first love, Swan, but she’s nothing compared to you.”

She can’t do anything for a few seconds, her brain rendered absolutely useless by his words. And then it clicks into place somehow and she’s surging forwards to meet his lips with hers, pressing into him as he responds with an eagerness that she thought only she possessed. Her fingers are in his hair in an instant, carding through the soft locks as he moans.

When she pulls back finally it’s only so she can catch a breath. She keeps one hand in his hair and the other clenched at the collar of his shirt. Her voice is breathy when she speaks, “For my sake, think it over, Killian, don’t jump into this with your eyes shut.”

He releases a stuttering chuckle, “All I can think about right now are your lips, my darling. But, aye, for your sake.”

He always leaves, but damn it to hell, he always comes right back, too. It takes her a few moments before she adds, “And if you decide that you’d rather be out there, I’ll always be here for you to return to.” He moves forward and kisses her again, short and sweet.

“Thank you.”

She nods, lips still brushing his, “Just remember, you’ll always have a home here.”


End file.
